


A Wager For Brighton

by whiskeyandspite



Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Dangerous Games, Drunkenness, Established Relationship, Flirting, M/M, Teasing, implied gentle D/M undertones, wagers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-23
Updated: 2016-09-23
Packaged: 2018-08-16 22:27:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,246
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8119894
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whiskeyandspite/pseuds/whiskeyandspite
Summary: “Then the wager stands thus,” John replies, spreading his hands in a gesture of good will. “Should I fail to prove to you the truth of my tale, I will be left licking my wounds,”

  “And rightfully so.”

  “But should I manage,” John continues, raising his voice over the interruption. “You will join me in Brighton, and you will join me without argument, and I will teach you to never doubt my word again.”
Our gentlemen play a little game over a nightcap.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [SLSmith22](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SLSmith22/gifts).



> Written for a very good friend.
> 
> Alright, cards on the table - I have been a Sherlockian for as long as I can remember, and I have always resisted writing for the fandom - I have never felt good enough. That's not to say that I do now, but I got whacked by the plot bunny of inspiration and so here we are.
> 
> This isn't based on any iteration in particular - they sort of exist in my mind as their own entities at this point, honestly, but feel free to apply the faces of your favourites as needed!

It had started with one story, a single story, and that story had started - in and of itself - because of a drink. 

One drink. Then many drinks. 

One story. Then many stories. 

John wouldn’t have continued them, perhaps, if Sherlock hadn’t been so insistent on asking him endless questions, pulling at inaccuracies, pacing his mind against John’s experience.

John Watson has always been of a competitive sort, though he rarely allows that side to come out around others. To most, the doctor is passive and soft-spoken, perhaps a little dry, but hardly the nuisance that Sherlock Holmes is. 

Though, in truth, no one can quite match Sherlock for being a nuisance to others; he has far too much fun being one and wouldn’t soon give up such a long-standing hobby.

“A doctor would not allow himself to be so reckless with his hands,” Sherlock interrupts again, brandy dark in his glass as he regards his companion over the rim of it. “Not you, to be certain, Watson. I believe not a word of your tale.”

“Is there a time, any at all, where you believe any word but your own?” John asks him, tilting his head and glass along with it. Sherlock follows the motion with his eyes but doesn’t mimic it.

“On occasion.”

“Name one.”

“Just last week,” Sherlock points out, proud that he can, in fact, name one. “When a paperboy mentioned that there was a chance of rain and within the half hour the sky opened up and proved him quite right.”

John takes a languid sip of his brandy and sucks his bottom lip into his mouth. Sherlock follows that with his eyes too, smiling when John doesn’t contradict him. He had been present, in fact, for the forecast, and had taken shelter with Sherlock beneath an awning when the rain had, as predicted, begun to pour.

The silence makes Sherlock restless.

“I am a man of action, Watson,” he adds after a moment. “Words are fleeting things, inconsequential in the best of times.”

“Are they?” John murmurs.

“Some,” Holmes shrugs, eyes deliberately away from his friend as he sets his glass to his bottom lip. “Most. You, my dear Watson, are perhaps one of the few people on this earth worth listening to.”

“But not worth being taken at his word.”

Sherlock grins. Though John’s lips do not twitch even a little to show his own pleasure, his eyes burn with it. He is deep enough in his drink that his fierce and fast nature comes through, making itself clearer and clearer.

“I’m afraid I’ve yet to see you truly reckless,” Holmes tells him, deliberately ignoring the bare narrowing of Watson’s eyes at such a blatant lie. “I’ve yet to see you really let go of your rather enviable bedside manner and become the soldier again. In public, at least. The facts remain, of course, that you were a doctor, and that you have killed and healed in equal measure in your time in Afghanistan.That, I do not doubt, my dear, I merely doubt the facts in your retelling. Entirely improbable, the lot of it.”

John considers him in silence, turning the glass in his fingers, and leaving just a trace of his fingerprints against it as he does. Over and over, turn and return. The brandy gently moves within, and Sherlock allows himself to time his pulse to the contunuous sway of the dark liquid.

“Alright,” Watson says after a moment, setting his glass down without drinking from it. He adjusts his position in the chair, knees wide, sore leg set flat against the floor while he presses the toe of his other to the rug beneath. “A wager, then.”

“I do like those,” Sherlock smiles wider, bringing his hand to his face, the side of his thumb between his teeth. He is restless, now, the warmth of the drink having gone to his head and his groin in equal measure, a blissful distraction from the tedium of the day. “But would it be wise, doctor? You’re rarely lucky in your gambling. It’s why I keep the books.”

“A wager,” John repeats, gesturing for Sherlock to stand, and the other does, with a deliberately deep sigh and a petulant rolling of his eyes. He unfolds himself from the setee and pushes his hands deep into the pockets of his robe. “That I can prove the truth of my story. Right here.”

“You suppose you can, do you,” Sherlock allows, setting one foot atop the other, careful to keep his balance even as he continues to fidget. He frees his hands from his pockets and wraps one arm around his middle, setting his other elbow to that wrist. “Very well. And should you prove unable to?”

“You will find yourself learning quickly the finer points of suturing,” John tells him, raising a brow. He watches Sherlock shiver at the thought, fighting hard to remind John that he is already rather well educted in the art. “Should I prove able to, however,”

“Yes?”

“Then you will come with me to Brighton,” Watson tells him, sitting back. “For the week, as I have asked many times for you to and you have every time denied me.”

“Oh dull, Watson, dull,” Sherlock whines, turning on his heel and setting both feet to the floor as he folds his arms with a huff. “I could come any day with you to Brighton.”

“Then why haven’t you?”

“I’ve no desire to,” Sherlock tells him, stepping nearer his friend and bending to take up his glass. “But I am far from incapable of joining you on your outings.”

“Then the wager stands thus,” John replies, spreading his hands in a gesture of good will. “Should I fail to prove to you the truth of my tale, I will be left licking my wounds,”

“And rightfully so.”

“But should I manage,” John continues, raising his voice over the interruption. “You will join me in Brighton, and you will join me without argument, and I will teach you to never doubt my word again.”

The detective says nothing. He needn’t, for John to know that he agrees to the terms. He needn’t, for John to know that every ounce of Holmes’ being aches to be proven wrong for a change, by the only man who would dare to.

With a click of his tongue, Sherlock acquesces, reaching with his free hand to take John’s to shake. He holds it a moment longer than necessary. He lets his thumb draw warm over John’s work-worn knuckles before letting go.

“A top up?” He asks, holding up John’s glass.

“And the knife, if you would, Holmes.”

Sherlock goes.

There is a cant to his hips that makes for a pleasing distraction, and John watches unabashedly his infuriating friend as he stalks to the kitchen for the bottle and the larger of their cooking knives. Of course it would be the larger. John snorts but remains unfazed. His eyes fix on the middle distance as Sherlock returns, and he unfolds his fingers for the glass to be placed within them.

It’s been a long time since he was the man in his stories. Five years, now, living with Sherlock Holmes and building a new facade over an old form. He remembers every moment, though he refuses to relive many of them. He does not hone any of his skills, now, save for his bedside manner, as Holmes enjoys calling it in jest, and his sense of humor. WIthout either, live with the detective would be intolerable.

Life without the other would be far crueler, however, and both know that.

“To the table, please,” John says, taking a sip of his drink and gesturing to the knife in Holmes’ other hand. Holmes sets it down, and then gracefully sinks to the floor, ankles crossed and arms around his knees. He can see, from this vantage point, the tabletop and knife upon it, as well as the rise of Watson’s knees and the barely defined bulge between them. He is more than happy to keep his gaze upon it until the doctor’s hands obscure his view, turning the knife between his fingers over and over.

“Now, Holmes, I need you to pay attention.”

“My dear doctor, you have my attention, at its utmost undivided.”

John waits until Sherlock raises his eyes enough to meet his, and only then leans closer, setting one palm aginst the table, fingers splayed wide. His other takes hold of the knife in a practiced grip, blade-down, fingers curled carefully around the handle, and thumb set against the butt of it.

Sherlock keeps his eyes on John’s until the doctor breaks the gaze first and directs Holmes’ eyes down to the matter at hand. WIthout a word, no boasting or preamble, John sets the tip of the blade in the space between his thumb and forefinger, pressing to the table. Then he lifts it, moves it to the space between the forefinger and the middle, then between the middle and ring finger, then between that and his little finger. A slow and deliberate demonstration that Sherlock obediently watches. Watson repeats the motion, stabbing and careful, though just as slow, back the way he came.

And when he begins the game anew, he moves quicker.

Over and over, the knife finds its mark against the table. Over and over, John strikes true, his hand unscathed.

The room is silent but for the thud of the blade, faster and faster between his fingers, moving, now, at a speed far too dangerous. Far too fast for someone inebriated. Far too fast for someone unpracticed at this.

Sherlock holds his breath, times the quick beats of his heart to every strike against the wood. More and more John speeds up, showing no indication of stress or worry, no indication of a desire to stop. He is concentrating, brows furrowed as his eyes follow the movement of the knife held tight in his fist.

He does not err.

Then, with a ringing silence following, John stops the knife, point set into the now obvious and somewhat deep grooves in the wood between his fingers. His breath is just a little unsteady, cheeks just a little flushed.

Sherlock doesn’t even realize he has made a sound until John looks at him. His own breathing is uneven, his pulse far too quick at his throat. The man before him is extraordinary. The man before him is absolutely marvellous.

“My dear, you are magnificent,” Holmes admits, voice perhaps a little unsteady. “Truly. Without a single doubt.”

“Are you certain?” John asks him, allowing the corners of his lips to turn up, his top lip to tremble, his moustache to twitch.

“Quite,” Sherlock nods, swallowing thickly. “I am, in fact, quite certain. WIthout a shadow of a doubt.”

“Rather a turnaround from how this wager began, then,” John points out, and Sherlock’s laugh comes unbidden and weak from his lips.

“No man is infallible,” he shrugs. “Although I myself may come close, there are exceptions to every rule and any constant, my dear Doctor Watson. You may just happen to be mine.”

John turns the knife carefully on its tip and lays it to the table, only removing his prone hand when he lets the handle go. Sherlock sits forward before he can stop himself, reaching to take John’s hand and gently fold it against his thumb before bringing the doctor’s knuckles to his lips to kiss reverently. His breath pushes eddies against the back of John’s hand, and when he parts his lips from skin, he turns his cheek against it next.

“Remarkable,” he whispers. “Tenacious, reckless man, how I adore you.”

John allows the affection, feeling his heart settle as Sherlock nuzzles against him. Though his words are truth enough, there is a weight beneath them that John values far more. There is concern, there is relief, there is a bone-deep arousal that one needn’t be the great Sherlock Holmes to sense.

John’s other hand settles to Sherlock’s hair and he buries his fingers in the silken strands.

“Will you doubt me again, then?”

“I cannot fathom a moment I ever could,” Holmes replies softly.

“Will you cede that the wager has been settled?”

“Quite decidedly,” Sherlock agrees. John can feel his smile against his wrist, and turns his hand gently to set his fingers beneath Sherlock’s chin, tilting it up so he can look into the grey eyes that watch him as though he is the most incredible mystery in this world.

Perhaps he is, in a way.

“Will you accept your defeat, Sherlock Holmes?” John asks him.

Sherlock’s adam’s apple bobs against John’s fingertips and he slides them lower, his palm against Sherlock’s throat in their place as they seek over his sharp collarbones instead.

“I shall admit an error -”

“Sherlock.”

“A lapse in judgement. Rare lapse in judgement on my part.”

“Sherlock.” That tone brokes no argument. Holmes knows this. He doesn’t skirt the question again.

“I accept my defeat, doctor,” he says, “and gladly so.”

“Good.” John smiles. “Then I suggest you go and pack a valise. I will procure us tickets for the earliest train for Brighton, come morning.”

Sherlock doesn’t argue, he doesn’t fuss. He merely pushes higher up on his knees and presses his lips to John’s own, taking a gentle kiss and offering himself entirely with it.

“Of course, my dear Watson.” he murmurs. “For you, my dear, anything.”


End file.
